


The Lord of Gothos

by Basingstoke



Category: Doctor Who, Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Character of Color, Crossover, Multi, Superpowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-30
Updated: 2009-11-30
Packaged: 2017-10-04 00:56:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Basingstoke/pseuds/Basingstoke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Enterprise's five-year mission is to seek out new life forms and new civilizations. They frequently succeed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lord of Gothos

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to jacquez for the beta.

"Stardate 2126.1, Lieutenant Uhura reporting. I am in command of the Enterprise. Captain Kirk, Commander Spock, Doctor McCoy, Lt. Sulu, Lt. Jaeger, and Yeoman Rand have been abducted by the entity known as Trelane. Currently the ship is in orbit around the planet called Gothos by the entity. This far..." She sighs. "We don't know what to do. A frontal approach has been ineffectual. Escape has proved impossible. All we can do is attempt to negotiate. Uhura out." Pavel hears her release the recorder behind him. He stares at the console, tracking the various readouts.

Pavel is flying the ship alone. He can do it, of course, but he's terribly afraid for Sulu. There's no telling what might happen when you are at the whim of a powerful creature.

To his embarrassment, he wants to talk to his mother. She knows so much about these kinds of strange things, though! She's been everywhere. He only sees her every few years, usually on his birthday. It's his special present when she shows.

Then, under his hands, the readings go crazy. "Lieutenant! There is an energy reading on the bridge!" He feels a breeze on his cheek, and then hears a noise.

"Security! Security to the bridge!" Uhura shouts into the comms. She jumps to her feet as something materializes on the bridge between navigation and the command chair.

Something blue, something that pulses on the top... oh, no, it's the TARDIS. "Lieutenant Uhura, I do not think we are under attack," Pavel says. "I think it is my mother."

"Your mother?"

Pavel nods, blushing, as the TARDIS materializes. "I vill explain, I promise," he says as the door opens and the turbo lift opens and Jenny, his mother, steps out and security draws phasers on her.

"Hold fire!" Uhura yells.

"Pavel!" Jenny cries. She swoops down on him with open arms. She looks the same as she always has, barely older than him now. He thinks maybe her clothes are the same too. "I'm sorry I missed your birthday, my darling," she says. She kisses his cheeks.

"Hello, mum. This isn't such a good time. This is the bridge of the Enterprise," he explains. His mum doesn't always know where she is. It's the hazard of a time-traveler.

"Oh, I know. It's actually my dad that came by and I just tagged along to see my baby!" She kisses him again.

"Your dad?" He only met his mother's father once, when he was eight, but he remembers it clearly. How many people materialize in a big blue box?

Jenny puts her arm around him and takes him to the front of the TARDIS. "Do you remember your granddad?" she asks as his mother's father, the Doctor, steps out of the box.

"Yes." Of course he remembers! It's what made him want to be in Starfleet, so that he could get his own TARDIS. By the time he found out Starfleet didn't have TARDISes, he loved Starfleet anyway, for its own reasons.

"Hello!" the Doctor waves. "My, you've grown! Look at you!" He pats Pavel on the head. He also looks just the same, around thirty, where Pavel's mother looks around twenty. They're older than that, of course.

"Yes, I'm an adult now, and I'm on duty, and this is not a good time." Pavel glances from his mother's father to Lt. Uhura. She looks confused, and worried, and tired.

"Oh, this isn't a family visit. Well--just a bit of a family visit. Let me explain," the Doctor says. "Face! Get out here so I can lock the TARDIS."

A brown-haired humanoid presenting as a human male that Pavel doesn't know comes out of the TARDIS. He's carrying some kind of frame strapped across his back. He salutes and closes the door behind him, locking it with a piece of metal.

"We've come to rescue you," the Doctor says to Uhura, grinning. "I'm the Doctor! This is my daughter Jenny and my, well, call him traveling companion, the Face of Boe."

Uhura salutes. "Lieutenant Nyota Uhura, currently in command of the USS Enterprise."

"Charmed," the Face of Boe says with a broad grin. Pavel wonders if he's also Gallifreyan or something else. He smells very, very old, much older than the Doctor. Older than most rocks, actually. Then he turns and takes Pavel by the shoulders. "Well!" he says. "I can see him in you. That has pluses and minuses, as I'm sure you're aware."

"Yes, sir. Like right now," Pavel says. He feels very small in front of this creature who is assuredly not a human. The Face of Boe snorts and lets him go. Jenny hugs him again.

The Doctor looks around. "The Enterprise! You've done well, Pavel."

"Thank you, Doctor," Pavel says.

"We need to get down to the planet. We meant to get to the planet, actually," the Doctor says, looking back at the TARDIS. "I think the old girl wanted to see young Pavel again."

"He means the TARDIS, not me!" Jenny stage whispers.

"She's willful, but there's no better ship in the world," the Face of Boe says.

"Your ship has a mind of its own?" Uhura asks.

"Doesn't yours? Come on, let's go!" the Doctor says, grabbing Uhura's hand. She startles back, but gestures security to stand down when they raise their phasers.

Uhura says, "DeSalle, you have the conn. Chekov and I will accompany our guests to the surface," as the Doctor tugs her into the turbo lift. Pavel follows with his mother's arm still around him. The Face of Boe crowds in behind them.

"So--Mr. Doctor?" Uhura asks.

"Just the Doctor," the Doctor says, still grinning.

"Doctor. How did you know we needed saving?"

The Face of Boe holds up a small machine. "We have a monitor on Trelane." The turbo lift door opens at the transporter room and the Face of Boe continues, "It went off, I got the Doctor, and by coincidence Jenny was visiting. And then, by coincidence, the ship Trelane caught was the one young Pavel is on. Chains of coincidence being a family trait with this lot. Get used to it."

"I see," Uhura says. "Mr. Scott. Five to beam down to the surface. We're rescuing the away team. Monitor communications and be ready to get us out of here."

"Aye, sir." Scott says.

"Ooh, this is exciting! Never used one of these before." The Doctor grins up at the transporter pad. "Whee!" he says as they materialize on the surface. "Tingly!"

"Itchy," the Face of Boe says, rubbing his arms. Pavel can't feel anything except his mum hugging him again. She only let go for the beam-down.

"Mum, I'm the nawigation officer for the entire ship! I'm grown up now!" Pavel mutters.

"Oh, but I see you so rarely! I just want to hug my baby." She sings the last word. Pavel sighs.

The Doctor sniffs the air. "That way," he says, pointing. He takes Uhura's hand again and starts running. Jenny takes Pavel by the hand and skips like the girl she appears to be.

They're running through what looks like a garden. Ahead is a building, like old Earth architecture. It reminds him a bit of the Hermitage, actually, in St. Petersburg. Uhura's ponytail bounces as they run. "Would it be rude to ask what species you are? You look human!" Uhura says as they run.

"Gallifreyan! Except Boe, he's his own species."

"Self-evolution. It's nifty," the Face of Boe says.

"And I didn't realize Chekov is half human, it's not in his records."

"He's all human!" Jenny says. "I made him that way since he had to live with his father. How is Andrei?"

"He's fine, mum," Pavel says.

"Excellent!" She kisses him. "Anyway, it broke Dad's hearts."

"Didn't!" the Doctor says.

"Did! You moped for years. All blah blah Jenny, why aren't you repopulating the species, bloo bloo he's going to die in only a hundred years. Well, it's a brilliant time to be a human! He's got the family luck, he'll be fine, and I have another twelve incarnations to make a Gallifreyan baby with! Honestly." Jenny beams at him. It feels like sunshine. Behind them, the Face of Boe follows, silently, looking at some kind of machine he has with him.

"Left hand side!" the Face of Boe yells out. "There!"

"Right-o!" The Doctor and Uhura veer to the left and stop at the wall. "It's already broken!" the Doctor says.

"Really? It can't be completely broken, or all this wouldn't exist."

"Something's broken." The Doctor knocks on the wall. "Looks like we'll have to use the front door."

"Do you know what Trelane is, Doctor?" Uhura asks.

"Oh, yes. Come on!" He takes her hand again. Around the corner of the building is a large glass door which the Doctor opens.

"Captain!" Uhura cries. The Face of Boe, Jenny, and Pavel run in behind her. Inside, the alien--Trelane--is dancing with Captain Kirk, who's dressed in an old-fashioned black suit. They're waltzing as Spock plays what Pavel thinks might be a harpsichord. Sulu, Jaeger, McCoy, and Rand are frozen in place in the other side of the room, like a kind of living statue garden.

"Trelane. Did you ask first?" the Doctor asks. He sounds terribly disappointed.

Trelane stiffens and turns. "Mommy?"

The Face of Boe clears his throat and walks into the room as well. "That's enough of that."

Spock abruptly stops playing. Kirk steps back and crosses his arms. On the other side of the room, the human statues all fall over. "Ow!" Sulu yells. "That's my knee!"

"And that's my gut. I thought you were graceful."

"Daddy," Trelane says. He looks crushed.

The Face of Boe sets down the metal frame that was strapped to his back. "We'll discuss your behavior later, Trelane. Right now we're taking these people back to their ship."

"No! Daddy! I was just playing!" Trelane stamps his foot.

"Ah! Not so badly broken. Just out of place. Here we are," the Doctor says, lifting a piece of coral out of the wall.

"What is it?" Uhura asks.

"It's a CRDIS," the Doctor says. "Child Relative Dimension in Space. Right now, it's set on time-out, because Trelane's been very, very naughty."

"Mommy!" Trelane runs over and hugs the Doctor, who hands the coral to Uhura. "I was just playing! You like playing with the humans, why can't I?"

"Trelane, you have to ask first. We talked about this."

"Back to your crib." The Face of Boe flips a switch on the metal frame, activating a force field. "You need a nap."

"No, Daddy, no! I won't! I won't go!" Trelane stamps his feet wildly, pressing his face to the Doctor's shoulder.

"Trelane, playtime's over." The Doctor touches his hand to Trelane's head. Trelane fades and seems to shrink, his arms and legs vanishing while his head starts to glow. After a moment, there's nothing but a glowing ball which the Doctor carries to the force field crib.

"A child," Kirk says.

"You can keep the suit," the Face of Boe, looking Kirk over. He wiggles his eyebrows. "Regency suits you."

"Well, thanks, but I'd rather have my uniform." But Kirk smooths the lapels of the suit and fluffs up the neck-cloth.

Uhura turns the CRDIS over. As she handles it, first the harpsichord disappears, so that Spock falls on his butt. Then Captain Kirk's suit disappears, leaving him naked.

The Face of Boe looks down, Uhura looks down, Spock looks at the ceiling, Sulu looks at Pavel and silently cracks up laughing. Kirk rests his fists on his hips. "Can you explain what's going on?" Kirk asks the Face of Boe.

"My day just got better?" the Face of Boe says. "Actually, since Trelane is back in his crib, the CRDIS is shutting down the environment."

"Oh my!" the Doctor exclaims. "Better move before we run out of oxygen." The Doctor takes the coral. The Face of Boe takes their child. The walls disappear.

They return to the bridge using the CRDIS, which is smooth and instantaneous. Pavel wants very badly to take it apart and see how it works, but he suspects he won't be able to. Maybe he can ask his mum for one for his birthday.

DeSalle hesitates, looking at Kirk, but cedes the command chair when Kirk jerks his chin. Kirk continues to ignore his nudity and takes the chair. Pavel sits at navigation, along with Sulu. Spock still won't look at Kirk naked, Pavel notices, and is looking at Uhura's hair instead.

"So," Kirk says. "The dreadful Trelane is a little boy."

"Oh, well, a child, anyway," the Doctor says. "Gender..." He wiggles his hand.

"She's a clone of him, after all," the Face of Boe says, indicating Jenny. "Look, we're sorry about the kid. It's in an awkward phase and it's acting out."

"No permanent harm done," Kirk says graciously.

"So," Uhura says. "You and ze are the parents of Trelane, and Jenny is a clone of the Doctor, effectively zir daughter. Mr. Chekov is Trelane's uncle. Do I understand that correctly?" Spock eyes Pavel with intense interest. Oh dear. It feels much the same as being examined by the Face of Boe.

The Doctor takes the crib from the Face of Boe. He sets it and the CRDIS next to the TARDIS. "To be precise, the Face and I are the parents of Trelane. You'll have to go back to your old name, Jack." He's talking to the Face of Boe.

The turbo lift door opens. Another Face of Boe staggers out, supported by Mr. Scott and wrapped in a blanket. He points at the Face of Boe standing beside Pavel, shaking his hand emphatically.

"Right, that's more like it," the Doctor says. "The one and only, the Face himself."

"Mr. Scott, what is going on here?" Kirk asks.

"It was horrible. They beamed down and then this--this man started growing out of nothing, his insides first! He was all skinless and screaming!" Mr. Scott sounds like he's been through a war.

"Sorry, Face, I forgot how transporters work," the Doctor says. He cocks a thumb at Jack. "They destroy your body and then recreate you down to the atomic spin. This one's a perfect copy but he doesn't have your... you-ness." He licks the Face of Boe to be sure. "Yeah, 40 billion years, take or give a few million. Pavel, check the other one."

"Excuse me," Pavel says, and licks Jack's cheek.

"Oh, by all means," Jack says.

"Elewen minutes old," Pavel says. The taste of age is unmistakable.

But the Doctor looks horrified. "Jenny! What did you do to the poor boy's voice?"

"Your fault!" Jenny retorts. "You taught him Gallifreyan in the loom and you broke his phonemes!" She strokes his hair. "I'm sorry, my pet, ignore your grandfather."

"I don't have my me-ness?" Jack asks.

"No, he has his his-ness, you're back to human."

"What, you mean I'll die?" Jack asks.

"Fully human."

"God dammit, I was just getting the hang of immortality," Jack says. He sits on the arm of Pavel's chair.

The Face of Boe straightens up painfully. He pats Mr. Scott's shoulder. "Look, you take the sprog, Doctor," the Face of Boe says. "You're better with him."

"Can't," the Doctor says. "I have to see an Ood about a man."

The Face of Boe sighs. "Fine," he says, and crosses the bridge to pick up the crib.

"Excuse me," Kirk says. "We have some questions for you."

The Doctor grins. "Pavel can answer them! He's a bright boy." He walks over, ruffles Pavel's hair, and unlocks the TARDIS. "Come on, Jenny. Come on, Jack. Ooh, it's like an old folks home in here."

Jenny bends down and kisses Pavel's forehead. "Goodbye, dear. I'll try not to let it be so long next time."

"Bye, mum." There's no use asking her to stay, never has been. Besides, he wouldn't want her on the Enterprise anyway. She's his mum.

She, the Doctor, and Jack walk into the TARDIS and close the door.

The Face of Boe looks at Kirk as the TARDIS vanishes in a shimmer of blue paint and mechanical noise. "I'd ask why you're naked, but... well. No time this time. We'll meet again and that's a promise." He picks up the crib, hands Kirk his blanket, and turns into a ball of light. The light surrounds the metal crib. They both vanish.

Kirk wraps himself in the blanket, toga-style. "Mr. Chekov."

"Yes, sir," Pavel says.

"Full report in... half an hour."

*

The formal report is easy. He just nods while Uhura pieces it together. "Your mother and zir father are time travelers. That's why you had to tell zir where and when ze was. Your mother left you with your father because wherever ze lives isn't really suited for humans."

"Yes, sir," Pavel says.

"The Face of Boe used to be human, but ze's immortal, and ze's been changing over the course of 40 billion years."

"I guess so. I don't know zir, sir," Pavel says.

"Ze was copied because ze has some sort of--power--that isn't touched by the transporter, and ze recreated zir body from scratch. I can't imagine how that would work," Uhura says, looking at Spock.

"I am very interested in the tapes and readings. I will be studying them for some time," Mr. Spock says.

Uhura turns back to Pavel. "And you know Gallifreyan, which is a language I've never even heard of." Uhura's eyes glitter.

"Ah... yes, sir."

Kirk is looking through Pavel's records. "Father Andrei Chekov, mother Jenny, no surname, no maternal grandfather listed. Psychic test a few points above average, but nothing exceptional. Is there anything else you should tell us?"

"I don't think so," Pavel says. "When I was eight I explored the TARDIS and found a jungle and a waterfall and a unicorn. It's bigger on the inside." Spock is there, standing over the Captain's shoulder, staring him down, but at the end verifying his truthfulness. Pavel always tells the truth. Lying makes his head hurt.

"Huh. Call me if your family comes back to visit, Mr. Chekov," Captain Kirk says.

"Yes, sir."

No, it's the mess hall that's hard. "So, can you make a pencil float?" Sulu asks.

"No!"

"Are your powers linked to your speech impediment?"

"No!"

"Can you zap me with lightning?"

Pavel shuts his eyes and points his finger at Sulu, trying very very hard. But nothing happens.

"Aw, man."

"All I can do is tell how old things are. My soup crackers are fifteen minutes old," he says, and eats one to prove it. Yes, made fifteen minutes and four seconds ago when he called them up on the replicator. He leans over and licks Sulu's forehead quickly, getting a mouthful of hair. "You're tventy-six. Your hair is five months old. Your hair *gel* is sewenteen months old."

"Ew!" Sulu snorts out a laugh and pushes Pavel away.

"And I'm lucky sometimes," Pavel says. "I end up in lucky places. But I can't make it happen, and I don't know vhen it's happening, it's just vhen I look back I notice so many more coincidences than you vould think vould happen. So I try not to think about it. I couldn't sawe Mr. Spock's mother with it." He looks down. That still hurts. He dreams frequently about the icons on the screen, trying to catch them with his hands.

"So how old is your mom?" Sulu asks. "She's cute."

"Ower one hundred," Pavel answers absently. Then his head snaps up and he says, "No! No, you may not date my mother! Newer!" He throws his crackers at Sulu. Sulu laughs, ducking under the table. "You are sick sick man, Hikaru Sulu!" Pavel shouts.

*

the end.


End file.
